‘Not every guy lights the league on fire at 18′: Blackhawks’ Bedard still believes his breakout is coming
Vibes can’t predict everything. But damned if Connor Bedard didn’t feel like a player on the verge of a long-awaited breakout when he walked into a small conference room at the Waldorf Astoria on the Las Vegas Strip during at the NHL Player Media Tour in September.
The breezy swagger was immediately obvious. He cracked jokes about vetoing trades in the Chicago Blackhawks’ fantasy football league, for which he serves as co-commissioner. He mocked himself for rhyming off too many nice things about teammate Frank Nazar, who had just signed a lucrative contract extension. Bedard didn’t seem to carry on his shoulders the pressure of a supposed generational talent who, if we’re being honest, hasn’t quite lived up to the billing across his first two NHL seasons after going first overall in the 2023 NHL Draft.
To be fair, Year 1 of Bedard’s career was shortened to 68 games by a broken jaw and still yielded the Calder Trophy as rookie of the year and the highest per-game scoring rate of any 18-year-old since Connor McDavid’s debut campaign. The debut was plenty good. But Bedard only produced one additional goal and six more points in Year 2 despite playing all 82 games. He generated far fewer shots, scoring chances, high-danger chances and expected goals per 60 minutes at 5-on-5. Bedard straight-up regressed in his sophomore season, during which he endured an 12-game goal drought at one point and expressed frustration over his play. His Blackhawks “improved” by only nine points, from 52 to 61, good for 31st overall in the league standings.
But during that trying all-around second season, Bedard learned to cope along the way, to stop bringing the game home in his mind when he and the team were struggling, and to remember how privileged he was to be an NHL player.
“I think you’ve just got to play,” Bedard told a small group of reporters last month. “We’ve been playing since we were four or five years old. I’ve always loved the game, and I don’t think that should change once you get to the NHL. Obviously, it’s more attention and I guess pressure, but it’s still just hockey. So you’re living your dream and enjoy it and do your best.”
As Bedard points out, no one wants to get used to losing, to expect to play poorly, which applies to himself and the entire Blackhawks team, which is the NHL’s third-youngest by average age at 26.04. But as he also notes, plenty of successful franchises today had to endure difficult years preceding their contention windows, from 2015 No. 1 overall pick McDavid’s Edmonton Oilers, who missed the playoffs in three of his first four seasons, to the back-to-back defending Stanley Cup champion Florida Panthers, who missed in six of their first seven seasons after selecting Aleksander Barkov second overall in 2013.
And on an individual level: McDavid and Sidney Crosby aren’t the templates for every generationally excellent player. Not dominating as a teenager doesn’t mean the Hall of Fame has permanently padlocked its doors for your career. Look at the Colorado Avalanche’s Nathan MacKinnon. He won the Calder Trophy in a solid but unspectacular rookie season but languished in mediocrity for the next three. Four years into his career, MacKinnon averaged just 21 goals and 56 points per 82 games and had played in one playoff series. Then he went nuclear in his age-22 campaign and has been an all-world megastar ever since. Should he thus be the role model for Bedard to follow?
“Not everyone’s winning the Hart Trophy at 19, like Crosby, McDavid,” Bedard told Daily Faceoff. “That’s hard to do. [MacKinnon] is someone, Jack Hughes, most guys at 18, 19, when I came into the league at 18, I thought, ‘I’m going to be the best,’ and then last year, ‘I’m going to be the best,’ and that’s the mentality I have to have. I don’t really want to compare my path to another guy’s path. There’s been a lot of guys that maybe at 18, 19 didn’t light the league on fire and then did eventually.”
Bedard, now 20, remains patient, coolly confident the Big Year is coming. Perhaps that’s why he and his camp have been in no hurry to sign his second NHL contract. His entry-level pact expires after this season, making him a restricted free agent. But he hasn’t come anywhere near his superstar ceiling yet, and if he does so this year, it could line that wallet a little more. Whatever happens, Bedard isn’t worried at all about hammering something out with GM Kyle Davidson.
“We’ve talked a little bit, just kind of normal, and neither of [is] are panicked about getting something done,” Bedard said last month. “Just let it happen naturally, and we have a great relationship. I want to be there, they want me there, so it’ll get done when it gets done.”
The mentality seemed to be right heading into training camp. Bedard also felt certain the Hawks, despite a fairly conservative offseason, could improve in 2025-26 largely because their collection of young talent was ready to ascend, from him and Nazar to defensemen Sam Rinzel and Artyom Levshunov.
So what have we seen so far in this young season?
The Hawks are 2-2-1 through five games, the ‘W’ column punctuated by their 8-3 romp over the Seattle Kraken Wednesday. Chicago started 2-2-1 last season, too, so it’s early to pass judgement. As for Bedard: the two goals and six points through five games are certainly encouraging, but there’s work to do. He and linemates Colton Dach Andre Burakovsky have been absolutely caved in at 5-on-5, outchanced 23-10, and Bedard’s individual play-driving metrics have been legitimately bad. But it could be a simple matter of coach Jeff Blashill finding the right linemate chemistry: as Bedard’s results have been much better when playing without Dach and Burakovsky so far.
Which is a roundabout way to say: it’s early. The sample sizes are small. But at least Bedard has gotten results through five games, even if he’s been a bit lucky. Should he maintain the perspective he gained last season, not getting too high or too low, never taking his career for granted and understanding how young he still is, it will keep him from pressing as much. And we could see that MacKinnon- or Hughes-level breakout.
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POST SPONSORED BY bet365
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